Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Hiatus: Over
I arrived in Montreal on the Monday. School started yesterday evening with my first class at Concordia: Real Time Digital Audio: Theory and Practice, taught by Prof. Chris Salter. I am looking forward to the term ahead with GREAT ANTICIPATION. Tonight I am off to see a production by Robert Lepage, in Quebec City, Champ Libre is coming up soon too and setting up the new studio with Candace, Evan, Patrick and Xin Wei.
I also wanted to post a couple of video's on the blog, shorts I had watched this summer in Winnipeg for a movie and math fest. Here's Pixilation, by Lillian Schwartz, 1971.
Also trying to locate a decent version of Googolplex - anyone know where to find? ciao.
I also wanted to post a couple of video's on the blog, shorts I had watched this summer in Winnipeg for a movie and math fest. Here's Pixilation, by Lillian Schwartz, 1971.
Also trying to locate a decent version of Googolplex - anyone know where to find? ciao.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Project Three: Documentaion Cont' & Door Construct
Exterior Elevation Drawings A002 & A003. G. Rubin
Details: Laser cut pieces for Door Construct. G. Rubin
Monday, March 24, 2008
Project Three: Tangent
!achtung! Below is a video of music I like to hear in my head while I work in the cold, outside, on my box.
Friday, March 21, 2008
Project Three: Documenting the Work
Above is a template of how I document the drawing work on the Black Box.
I am making an archive of the drawings on the black box & in the black box by photographing entire elevations of each wall I draw on. I take a photo, then invert the image - turning white lines into black, black walls into white paper. The elevations, arranged one next to the other at the same scale becomes a construction drawing document. The series of elevations documented over time shows the progress of the work. It will be a record of the decisions made in drawing leading to making: a construction drawing set - an archive of the built work, a prescriptive language of how the phenomena is made apparent through drawing. The drawing as the language of the architect.
The language of the drawing, and the construction set as encyclopedia, compliments the tacit knowledge embedded in the built work. And vice verse.
I can also add to the drawings once they are arranged in the drawing set. I can bring into my studio measured information about the black box, and continue the process of drawing without being at the site. The drawing will give me a "whole view" of the project, an effect not apparent when I am standing outside the black box itself, dominated by it's one to one scale. I can reflect on the work, make adjustments at other scales otherwise not possible if I only carried on the work on site. Being able to transport the black box with me to different places will enable me to continue the project say, in the evening, when it is too dark to work outside. The drawing will help me organize the work schedule. Daylight hours are dedicated to actually making on site, while drawing, and building in the shop could take place at night, or when the weather is too difficult to manage.
Friday, March 7, 2008
Project Three: Getting out there
Whoa! thanks guys for all the help in trucking out this beast onto the lawn (what lawn---all I see is snow) in between the School of Architecture and CAST. The black box is now "at home".
foundation: shoveling snow and putting down cinder blocks
erection: view of Black Box through the trees. And, one of four elevations
video: black box on the move
foundation: shoveling snow and putting down cinder blocks
erection: view of Black Box through the trees. And, one of four elevations
video: black box on the move
Friday, February 29, 2008
Project Three: Finishing the Assembly
CC Assembly: (above) - view of interior space, with latter (scale). And below, several shots taken during the assembly.
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Project Three: Layes of a sealed space
latex paint - black and red
Standard 4' X 8' sheets of OSB determine the limits of the space
Vapour Barrier and Foil and Heat Gun - making a continuous seal
Detail of Vapour Barrier heat seal from initial testing- some shrinkage!
The structure is a stud wall construction. Two layers (permeable and impermeable) make up the "original" building envelope: sheathing (interior and exterior finishes) and Vapour Barrier.
The latter layer seals the interior space from the forces of air and water existing in the exterior environment. And it establishes, alongside the perceived rigid and generic form of the wood enclosure, the parameters of equilibrium between interior and exterior space. So long as the Vapour barrier remains a sealed, no moisture can pass between the wall, and into both spaces.
To ensure that this is properly made, I have heat sealed the vapour barrier at the intersection of wall to wall, wall to floor and wall to roof connections. Rather than risk breaking the seal with nails traditionally used to fix the Vapour Barrier to the stud wall, I have welded the different plastic frames together.
I have also distinguished the two sides of sheathing. The exterior is painted black, and the interior faces painted deep red. Though both surfaces are the same material, I want to establish a clear difference between the homogeneous interior space's enclosure from the exteriors facade. Starting with the appearance of a solid, form from the outside, I will soon discover, after entering the space, that is is fact a composite envelope.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
frame of mind
Video and photos of the black box assembly - week no.1
The persistent violation of space and order.
Water is the great enemy of the contemporary building envelope building in northern environments.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
ca..ca..ca..cuttin'
I have begun to assemble the frame. First, the floor frame and then onto the walls.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Black Box/C.C. beginnings
Above are measured drawings of the black box. I will building the room out of 4' X 8' Oriented Strand Board (OSB) sheets, 2X4 X8' Spruce studs, yellow zinc wood screws, and 8X8X16 concrete cinder block.
Water and Architecture: I have turned to a number of sources of inspiration, local and beyond, for the design of the black box. One is the story of the biblical flood, and Noah's Ark. Second is the Kabbah, the room built by Abraham for Ishmael. And third are two buildings in North Point Douglas, one recently built, and the other as old as the first developments of the Point Douglas neighbourhood in the 1870's. For each of these examples, I focus on the allegories of water as a destructive and creative force in Architecture. The different relationships between water and Architecture are complex, and dynamic. Time has permitted that this relationship change, mutate, develop, even contradict the first contacts between water and each of these buildings. How is this relationship going to be examined in the black box?
1 & 2
3 & 4
5 & 6
7 & 8
1. Noah and his sons constructing the ark, after God's design. 2. Michaelangelo depicting the flood and the destruction of humanity. 3 & 4. Flooding in the Harem and around the Kabba. 5 & 6. Flooding all thoughout Mecca, inside the passageway between the two mounts. 7. The Barber house, in NPD, built by businessman E.L. Barber in 1865. 8. circa 100 years after, we have this example of housing in NPD.
images sources:
kabba: http://www.hajjguide.org/old_rare_pictures.htm
noah: http://www.beloit.edu/~nurember/book/images/Old%20Testament/index.htm, http://www.geocities.com/ulrich_utiger/gen4.html
NPD: Gregory Beck Rubin
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Project Three (formerly New Project)
Walls are the most element aspect of architecture. That is because they limit space.
We build walls, like Vitruvius, to be pure and homogenous. However, if we slice through the walls of Vitruvius, and the prefabricated walls in a building in Winnipeg Today, they would bear no resemblance to one another. To accommodate both the ideal of architecture and the reality of building in a Northern climate, we have developed technologies that we can hide inside the wall. Perhaps if we had not thought of the wall the way Vitruvius taught us to, then we may not have designed all its layers in the way we have, compacted and, more importantly, hidden. The ideals we impose on our most basic tool, the wall, is indicative of the way we value space in general, both natural and artificial. If we were to envision this threshold between interior and exterior differently, we would regard the space differently. �
For my project, I will investigate the hidden space of the wall. The goal of the project is to explore new paradigms of the wall in the Canadian context, historical and environmental. The project takes on the wall as an iconographic symbol as well as technological system.
....................................
Much has happened in the past few weeks, and I will give a brief overview of these events.
When I began the project, I wanted to find space in Point Douglas where I could cut into an existing building envelope, preferably a home. The wood frame wall of most typical home constructions is in fact a "void wall". The cavity spaces inside the wall are the spaces where we hide vital infrastructure. By cutting into the wall, and revealing the hidden inside the wall I would do two things. First, I would identify the systems as they relate to the lived world. And second, by revealing hidden activity, I would alter my understanding of architecture, and its effects on our perceptions of internal and external spaces. �After a good few weeks of searching, I was generously offered space in a home. However, for a number of reasons, I have decided that the project will not be built in Point Douglas. Rather, I will build my own space here on campus, and go through the same exploration, closer to Studio, the lab equipment, etc... There are disadvantages and advantages to both situations (building on campus versus in Point Douglas), and I am going with my gut on this one.
(aside: Thanks very much to the good folks I have met in Point Douglas and helped me to get the space, but more importantly, introduce me to the neighbourhood and its various facets. I am still very keen to develop work in Point Douglas, and hopefully, this can happen in the future).
The plan now is to build a black box on campus. The space is defined by the walls that enclose it: a wood framed room closed and sealed: a non-space, a void space. After the space comes to be, I would enter the space, and begin to define it by revealing the layers of the wall in that space, creating new space. I have two roles to play in this project, and each role comes with its own set of questions. First, I will define the system that is the wall for establishing the black box space. What are they? The composite wall is a complex organism - is it autopoetic? What are the minimum layers or systems that make up this wall for it to limit space (and do what: sustain inhabitation)? Is there such a thing as space without someone to inhabit it? This last questions lends itself to defining my second role, that of observer/eventual inhabitant or the void space. I will have to enter into the black box (how?) and then transform the walls so that it can sustain me. But sustain me how? What is the essence of Architecture? In this sense, the walls and I take on the role of two performers. How will we interact?
The transformation of the black box is an evolutionary process. But it is also the site for recording the transformation. Similar to my last term's final installation, Curio, I intend to draw on the box, inside, outside, above, and all around. It is critical that both the drawing and whatever armatures, insertions, details and constructs are considered at the same scale.
The transformation is also directly linked to how my body, and its different senses measure and define space. We think that seeing space dominates all of our other perceptions of space. And this is largely true in the modernist context. But it is another contradiction, like the Vitruvian and the prefabricated wall section. Building architecture with all of our sense is essential to exploring the new paradigms of the wall.
Another rule I would like to establish throughout the process of this project, is to recycle/reuse existing building materials as I start to cut into the walls. Habitat for Humanity runs the Restore in town and there are all kinds of building materials they sell there. The black box itself will be built from dimension standardized parts: 4 X 8 plywood sheets, 2 X 4 lumber beams, rigid insulation, pipes, circuitry, etc... As I take apart these prefabricated components, what I will add should embody the same cultural phenomena which produced these materials and their attributes in the first place.
The project embodies the idea of expanding the systems and codes that are embodied in the architecture of the room. Bu building into the order of the wall, its expansion becomes an example of what potentials lies in the materials and language of building we employ today. The new spaces are there, and with rigorous and imaginative interpretations of their layers, they will be revealed, and their phenomena will affect our vision of architecture.
We build walls, like Vitruvius, to be pure and homogenous. However, if we slice through the walls of Vitruvius, and the prefabricated walls in a building in Winnipeg Today, they would bear no resemblance to one another. To accommodate both the ideal of architecture and the reality of building in a Northern climate, we have developed technologies that we can hide inside the wall. Perhaps if we had not thought of the wall the way Vitruvius taught us to, then we may not have designed all its layers in the way we have, compacted and, more importantly, hidden. The ideals we impose on our most basic tool, the wall, is indicative of the way we value space in general, both natural and artificial. If we were to envision this threshold between interior and exterior differently, we would regard the space differently. �
For my project, I will investigate the hidden space of the wall. The goal of the project is to explore new paradigms of the wall in the Canadian context, historical and environmental. The project takes on the wall as an iconographic symbol as well as technological system.
....................................
Much has happened in the past few weeks, and I will give a brief overview of these events.
When I began the project, I wanted to find space in Point Douglas where I could cut into an existing building envelope, preferably a home. The wood frame wall of most typical home constructions is in fact a "void wall". The cavity spaces inside the wall are the spaces where we hide vital infrastructure. By cutting into the wall, and revealing the hidden inside the wall I would do two things. First, I would identify the systems as they relate to the lived world. And second, by revealing hidden activity, I would alter my understanding of architecture, and its effects on our perceptions of internal and external spaces. �After a good few weeks of searching, I was generously offered space in a home. However, for a number of reasons, I have decided that the project will not be built in Point Douglas. Rather, I will build my own space here on campus, and go through the same exploration, closer to Studio, the lab equipment, etc... There are disadvantages and advantages to both situations (building on campus versus in Point Douglas), and I am going with my gut on this one.
(aside: Thanks very much to the good folks I have met in Point Douglas and helped me to get the space, but more importantly, introduce me to the neighbourhood and its various facets. I am still very keen to develop work in Point Douglas, and hopefully, this can happen in the future).
The plan now is to build a black box on campus. The space is defined by the walls that enclose it: a wood framed room closed and sealed: a non-space, a void space. After the space comes to be, I would enter the space, and begin to define it by revealing the layers of the wall in that space, creating new space. I have two roles to play in this project, and each role comes with its own set of questions. First, I will define the system that is the wall for establishing the black box space. What are they? The composite wall is a complex organism - is it autopoetic? What are the minimum layers or systems that make up this wall for it to limit space (and do what: sustain inhabitation)? Is there such a thing as space without someone to inhabit it? This last questions lends itself to defining my second role, that of observer/eventual inhabitant or the void space. I will have to enter into the black box (how?) and then transform the walls so that it can sustain me. But sustain me how? What is the essence of Architecture? In this sense, the walls and I take on the role of two performers. How will we interact?
The transformation of the black box is an evolutionary process. But it is also the site for recording the transformation. Similar to my last term's final installation, Curio, I intend to draw on the box, inside, outside, above, and all around. It is critical that both the drawing and whatever armatures, insertions, details and constructs are considered at the same scale.
The transformation is also directly linked to how my body, and its different senses measure and define space. We think that seeing space dominates all of our other perceptions of space. And this is largely true in the modernist context. But it is another contradiction, like the Vitruvian and the prefabricated wall section. Building architecture with all of our sense is essential to exploring the new paradigms of the wall.
Another rule I would like to establish throughout the process of this project, is to recycle/reuse existing building materials as I start to cut into the walls. Habitat for Humanity runs the Restore in town and there are all kinds of building materials they sell there. The black box itself will be built from dimension standardized parts: 4 X 8 plywood sheets, 2 X 4 lumber beams, rigid insulation, pipes, circuitry, etc... As I take apart these prefabricated components, what I will add should embody the same cultural phenomena which produced these materials and their attributes in the first place.
The project embodies the idea of expanding the systems and codes that are embodied in the architecture of the room. Bu building into the order of the wall, its expansion becomes an example of what potentials lies in the materials and language of building we employ today. The new spaces are there, and with rigorous and imaginative interpretations of their layers, they will be revealed, and their phenomena will affect our vision of architecture.
Friday, January 18, 2008
NEW PROJECT: site diagram: xtralrg, lrg, med
Point Douglas Site Investigation, extra large, large, medium. The site is on the North side of Higgins, just East of the former CPR station, West of the Disreali Freeway.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Curio: whistle while you work IV
All parts of the machine and the performance of the machine are built into the proscenium's structure. This includes the lighting and sound components of the installation. These two parts enhance the spectacle. I made the light and sound pieces from a combination of DIY and computer software for music mixing. The armatures for the light and sound were assembled from laser cut pieces.
detail view of the inside wall - light falls on the water tambourine and the water trough below the tambourine. Water condenses on the window then drips onto the tambourine or water trough, which carries this water back into the pot via a forth copper tube.
Making the spotlight lights with a hacked LED car light and 2 volt batteries. I used a combination of superbirght coloured and white LEDs.
Making the water tambourine with a hacked piezzo mic. and stereo cable. The sound is recorded and played live through Ableton Live. A speaker is installed on both the inside and outside of the wall.
Video recording of a sound test
Laser cut pieces cad file, one of two sheets
Plugs: installed on the inside and outside of the wall, these plugs can be removed by the observer. As you pull it out of the wall, you can feel the force of cold air currents sucking against the plug. That same force of air pushes moisture through the wall. One the inside we see ice starting to form along the edges of the plug ends.
Inside view of outside plug ends.
Inside plug, with ice forming around its openings edges.
Inside wall detail view of outside plug's ends and ice. An opportunity for collecting ice on the inside of the wall.
detail view of the inside wall - light falls on the water tambourine and the water trough below the tambourine. Water condenses on the window then drips onto the tambourine or water trough, which carries this water back into the pot via a forth copper tube.
Making the spotlight lights with a hacked LED car light and 2 volt batteries. I used a combination of superbirght coloured and white LEDs.
Making the water tambourine with a hacked piezzo mic. and stereo cable. The sound is recorded and played live through Ableton Live. A speaker is installed on both the inside and outside of the wall.
Video recording of a sound test
Laser cut pieces cad file, one of two sheets
Plugs: installed on the inside and outside of the wall, these plugs can be removed by the observer. As you pull it out of the wall, you can feel the force of cold air currents sucking against the plug. That same force of air pushes moisture through the wall. One the inside we see ice starting to form along the edges of the plug ends.
Inside view of outside plug ends.
Inside plug, with ice forming around its openings edges.
Inside wall detail view of outside plug's ends and ice. An opportunity for collecting ice on the inside of the wall.
Curio: whistle while you work III
The nature of the project had me work back and forth on the inside and outside of the proscenium. I used different materials to capture the water. For example, meshes were useful because they would deform as ice would form inside the material.
outside wall - final installation
ice sill - collecting data
sill armature: laster cut pieces and assembly
outside wall - mesh
video recording of out_side wall steam test
outside wall - final installation
ice sill - collecting data
sill armature: laster cut pieces and assembly
outside wall - mesh
video recording of out_side wall steam test
Curio: whistle while you work II
The openings in the wall bring the forces of the environment through the wall. It is a way for observers to engage with the wall, become participants in the experiment. Similarly in Montreal, the machine is activated by a motion sensor. The motion sensor will be located in an opening visible to persons on either side of the wall.
notional sketuch of wall section and elevation
inside wall - view of final installation: armatures, tubes and drawing
inside wall - final installation: machine and motion sensor
outside wall - armatures and tubes - sills, mesh, sound and light
notional sketuch of wall section and elevation
inside wall - view of final installation: armatures, tubes and drawing
inside wall - final installation: machine and motion sensor
outside wall - armatures and tubes - sills, mesh, sound and light
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